The Art of Hiding Read online

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  PRAISE FOR AMANDA PROWSE ‘A tragic story of loss and love.’ Lorraine Kelly, The Sun ‘Captivating, heartbreaking and superbly written.’ Closer ‘A deeply emotional, unputdownable read.’ Red ‘Uplifting and positive, but you may still need a box of tissues.’ Cosmopolitan ‘You’ll fall in love with this.’ Cosmopolitan ‘Warning: you will need tissues.’ The Sun on Sunday ‘Handles her explosive subject with delicate care.’ Daily Mail ‘Deeply moving and eye-opening.’ Heat ‘A perfect marriage morphs into harrowing territory . . . a real tear-jerker.’ Sunday Mirror ‘Powerful and emotional drama that packs a real punch.’ Heat ‘Warmly accessible but subtle . . . moving and inspiring.’ Daily Mail ‘A powerful and emotional work of fiction with a unique twist – a practical lesson in how to spot a fatal, but often treatable disease.’ Piers Morgan, CNN presenter ‘A truly amazing piece of drama about a condition that could affect any one of us in a heartbeat. Every mother should read this book.’ Danielle

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  OTHER BOOKS BY AMANDA PROWSE The Idea of You Poppy Day What Have I Done? Clover’s Child A Little Love Christmas for One Will You Remember Me? A Mother’s Story Perfect Daughter Three-and-a-Half Heartbeats (exclusive to Amazon Kindle) The Second Chance Café (originally published as The Christmas Café) Another Love My Husband’s Wife I Won’t Be Home for Christmas The Food of Love OTHER NOVELLAS BY AMANDA PROWSE The Game Something Quite Beautiful A Christmas Wish Ten Pound Ticket Imogen’s Baby Miss Potterton’s Birthday Tea

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. Text copyright © 2017 by Amanda Prowse All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher. Published by Lake Union Publishing, Seattle www.apub.com Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Lake Union Publishing are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates. ISBN-13: 9781611099553 ISBN-10: 1611099552 Cover design by Debbie Clement Cover photography by Amazon Imaging

  For my son Ben, who continues to be brilliant. We are behind you every step of the way. Dream big, Ben, and keep reaching for the stars. We love you . . .

  CONTENTS ONE TWO THREE FOUR FIVE SIX SEVEN EIGHT NINE TEN ELEVEN TWELVE THIRTEEN FOURTEEN FIFTEEN SIXTEEN BOOK CLUB QUESTIONS ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ONE Nina caught the red light only a spit away from the entrance to the boys’ school. It was a regular frustration at the beginning of the day and something she tended to see as an omen. Green light, good day. Red light, bad. ‘What’s for supper?’ Connor asked as he pulled at the seat belt of their Audi and flicked his overly long Bieberesque fringe from his eyes with a well-practised jerk of his head. ‘You’ve only just had breakfast!’ Nina smiled at her son, who sat forward with his school bag on his lap. Her youngest, Declan, gave a chuckle from the back seat. ‘I know, but I’m planning ahead. I’m always starving after my match.’ ‘Yes, I’d noticed.’ She pictured him in his rugby kit with mud-caked knees, tearing through the kitchen cupboards with locust-like enthusiasm in a desperate search for carbs or sugar, preferably both. ‘What have you got on today apart from the big match?’ ‘Nothing.’ Connor extracted his phone from his pocket and began to text with agile thumbs. She decided not

  TWO Nina sipped her coffee and stared out of the tall kitchen windows at the crisp blue Wiltshire sky. It was a morning like any other, except that it wasn’t. Sunshine streamed through the winter clouds and touched the distant fields and the grounds of The Tynings with its golden fingers. ‘They’re here, Mum,’ Connor called softly from the doorway. Ignoring the tremor of her hand, Nina emptied the coffee down the sink and walked to the foyer to find her black fitted jacket. She buttoned it up, looping the single string of pearls over the collar. Her fingers rested on the delicate silvery orbs, a gift from Finn. Connor and Declan stared at her from the hallway. The shiny black car wound its way along the lanes taking a route that was familiar. Sitting between the boys, eaten up by her own grief, she found it hard to offer words of solace or distraction on this peculiar day; instead, she held their hands, grateful for the contact. The car dropped them at the Haycombe Crematorium. As Nina

  THREE The boys decided to go back to school the day after the funeral, with only a week to go until the half-term holiday. Nina too thought this was a good idea: anything to get Connor to leave the cave of his bedroom, in which he had huddled himself away since Finn’s passing. All her efforts at trying to get him to open up to her had been met with monosyllabic grunts of acknowledgement, but very little else. The sound of his crying filtered under her door in the dead of night and she was torn, unsure whether to leave him to grieve alone or to intervene. If she were being completely honest, it was hard to find the energy required to further engage with him. She figured that second best was getting him to open up to his friends, and if this failed, then at least having him out of the house meant he was no longer staring at the four walls of his room. Declan, too, was quiet, clingier than usual, approaching her for hugs and nestling close to her on the sofa. Not that this was unexpected.

  FOUR Nina left the accountant’s office with the strangest feeling that she was floating. Her feet didn’t seem to be touching the ground, but she felt herself move slowly and deliberately towards the car. We’re losing our home! WE ARE LOSING OUR HOME! Oh my God, my God, Finn! I am scared. Eight million pounds. Eight million pounds. Eight million pounds. She started driving. Suddenly she found herself at the school, with no memory of the minutes that had elapsed. ‘Do you have an appointment?’ The Headmaster’s secretary leaned across the panelled reception desk, peering at Nina through her gold-framed glasses. Gripping her phone and car keys, she folded her arms across her chest, hoping this might stop the shaking. She was embarrassingly aware of the smell of sweat and vomit that lingered about her. She was always neat, always clean: she’d never forgotten the time when soap, scent and bubble bath were in short supply in her life. Right now her slovenly state was the least of her concerns.

  FIVE After a fitful sleep, Nina awoke before dawn. The boys still safely in bed, she tied her hair up with a square scarf and headed down to the basement to tape together cardboard boxes. She brought them upstairs, slowly filling them with ornaments and lamps from her bedroom as quietly as she could, packing stealthily, without any clue as to where she would next be setting up home. I need to rent somewhere, anywhere. I’ve probably got enough cash for a few weeks’ rent on something basic, and I need to get a job. But first, you have to pack stuff up, Nina, pack it away and keep it safe . . . She reached her hand to the back of the drawer in her bedside cabinet and stopped suddenly. She pulled out the fragile gold-coloured matchbox and stared at the words ‘Tordenskjold tœndstikker’ still visible on the aged container, along with a faded picture of a rather grand-looking admiral on the lid. There were only a couple of clear memories that stood out in her mind. In one – she could only hav

  SIX Nina spent much of the night watching the boys sleep. If they woke upset or alarmed, she wanted to be awake to comfort them. At 2 a.m. she thought she heard noises downstairs and her imagination ran wild, picturing the ham-fisted removal men, returned and roaming the rooms, looking for more items by torchlight. The idea caused her pulse to race and a fine film of sweat to break out over her body. She slipped from her bedroom and tiptoed down the stairs to the kitchen where she grabbed a left-behind butcher’s knife from the drawer. With her arm raised and teeth bared, she padded quietly from room to room, pulse racing, r
eady to lunge at whomever she found. There was no one, no sign of entry. With the knife still in her hand, she made her way back upstairs and opened the linen closet, the largest and most obvious place for someone to hide. Nothing. Lowering her weapon, she placed her hand on a wicker hamper inside. A memory sprang back to her. She remembered Finn giggling after a bot

  SEVEN Tiggy pulled the cigarette from her mouth and ground the butt into the kerb with her heel before waving slowly. Nina pulled the van up onto the pavement and cut the engine. It was without any of the imagined nostalgia that she returned to the postcode of her childhood. Instead there was a bitter tinge in her mouth that tasted a lot like failure. She looked across at Connor, who leaned forward, staring up at the dark brick building with an expression of horror. ‘This . . . this is where you grew up?’ he stuttered. His disbelieving tone made her feel raw, vulnerable. Letting this boy, whose opinion she valued above all others, see where she had lived stripped her of the carefully constructed façade he had known her by his whole life. ‘When we came here from Denmark, yes, after my mum died. We lived just around the corner.’ She was painfully aware of the catch to her voice and the way her face flared. It was an admission, a confession almost, that she was not like the other Kings No

  EIGHT Despite her exhaustion, Nina slept fitfully. The misshapen mattress, the cold and damp air, the bus that stopped outside their window, all interrupted the rest she desperately needed. The bus’s air brakes screeched at each approaching stop, making collections and drop-offs of drunken revellers, paying no heed to the fact that others might be sleeping in the middle of the night. ‘Joshy! Joshy! You dropped your scarf!’ She jumped up from the mattress at an ungodly hour to see a blond boy holding up a burgundy knitted scarf and his tall, dark-haired friend – Joshy she assumed – walking back to retrieve it with a lilt to his gait that suggested drunkenness. ‘Cheers, Liam!’ Joshy shouted. ‘See you later!’ As if it were mid-afternoon. If she thought there wasn’t the risk of waking her kids, she would have found the courage and yelled at Joshy and Liam to be quiet. Giving up on any more sleep, she stretched her aching back and put on her slippers, not only to stave off the cold but also

  NINE The three of them sat together on the green velour sofa, empty breakfast bowls nestling on their laps. Surprisingly, with this the only seating option, it was rare that the three sat like this, in a line, staring at the wall. Usually one of the kids took his breakfast cereal to the bedroom, or hung around the fridge in case a milk top-up was required. But it was cold out and sitting this way provided some measure of warmth. Nina sipped her first tea of the day and felt a little cleansed after yesterday’s bout of exhaustive crying. Both boys seemed to be in better moods, and the atmosphere was as pleasant as it had been in a while. There was a hint of spring to the sunny February morning; it felt like a fresh start. Just a few days before the next challenge: the boys starting at a new school. ‘I have to say that I know things are far from perfect, but right now I feel quite peaceful,’ she told the boys honestly. A bus wheezed to a halt outside the window and the noise of random sho

  TEN Nina lay for a while staring at the door of the bedroom, picturing a particular morning about a month before Finn died. He had peeled off notes from a wad in his wallet and laid them on the counter-top with a wink, as if tipping her: a fifties housewife being given her allowance. Now it made her blood run cold. I never for one second felt tricked or uncertain, but now? I’m not sure of anything, and that makes me sadder than I can say. Sitting up, she rubbed her face, ran her fingers through her wild hair and rose slowly to face this momentous day: the day her boys started their new school. It was also the day she would redouble her efforts in looking for a job, cast the net even wider and be prepared to travel even further. The prospect of both petrified her. With a mug of tea in her hand and ignoring the growl of hunger in her stomach, she raised the blind. The cold snap had thankfully passed and the winter sun sent a blue swathe over the rooftops. It was still chilly, but without

  ELEVEN Seven days later, Nina headed for her first day at work. She was nervous all the way there, but felt much better once she donned her hot pink polo shirt and was told the gentle agenda for the day: to shadow Fiona and a couple of the other girls. By 1 p.m., when they stopped for lunch, she took her seat in the break room with three other staff members, tucking into a delicious tuna and mayo sandwich, courtesy of the kitchen in which she was never destined to work. The break felt like a treat and she was more than grateful for the food. A big woman with a disarming laugh and a cap of bright red hair waved from across the narrow break room. ‘So how’s your first day going?’ the woman asked. ‘I’m Gilly, by the way.’ ‘There’s a lot to take in, but so far so good. And I’m Nina.’ ‘Well, we are a friendly bunch. You only have to shout if you’re unsure about anything. Or if you get really desperate, just pull one of them red emergency cords. That usually gets us running!’ ‘Oh, really? I d

  TWELVE April brought new life, promising green shoots erupting all around them. Daffodils sprouted on the verges and the trees burst with buds. It had been chilly last Easter at home when they had the pool to swim in and the gardens to wander; yet now, in this cramped little box with no outside space, the weather was glorious. Nina took a little joy in flinging open the French windows every morning to let the day in. She found herself waking naturally a little before her alarm. She made sure the boys had pizza in the fridge or a casserole in the oven if she was going to be home late. They managed. If anything, the responsibility was good for them. Declan remained a little tight-lipped about his school days, still slightly unnerved by the unruly antics of his peers, but in his usual inimitable fashion, he made the best of it. Connor veered between vociferously informing her how much he hated his school, his home, his life, and going very quiet. It was hard to say which she preferred. Al

  THIRTEEN Even though it was now May, the flat was still a little cold in the mornings. With windows only along one side of the building, most of their living space was in shadow. Nina was loath to put on the heaters, picturing the warm air carrying five-pound notes upwards, disintegrating and disappearing through the cracks in the yellowed ceiling; five-pound notes that she didn’t have to spare, and which Mr Broom Handle above would gleefully gather up. As the sun rose, it hit the large picture windows and pulled the chill from the place. There was a pleasant hour or so before midday, before the flat quickly became a little stifling, but right now, at this hour, it was cool and unpleasant and still a little damp. It reminded her of Gran’s flat, where the air felt icy against her lips, and if she blew out, her breath misted like smoke. Sometimes she’d raise two fingers and make out she was smoking a cigarette, like the grown-ups. She smiled at the thought. Once the boys were off to scho

  FOURTEEN Gilly, Moira and Lou invited her to their WhatsApp group and her phone pulsed daily with messages. It felt exciting to be included. They talked about everything, from baking disasters, shared for the comedy value (mainly from Gilly), to requests for lifts (mainly from Lou) and those round robin messages of support that you were instructed to send to women you admired and loved (largely from Moira). In the handful of times they had met up since the match, both at rugby training and in the Trago Lounge for the treat of shop-bought coffee, they had included Nina in the loveliest of ways. ‘So, my daughter is getting married, and I’m supposed to be dieting, but the more I worry about it and think about it, the more I eat!’ Lou reached for a sugar cube for her coffee and the others exchanged knowing smiles. ‘The wedding is six months away, and I have too much to do.’ ‘How can we help?’ Moira sipped the foam of her cappuccino. ‘Urgh, you can’t, honey.’ Lou batted away the offer. ‘Apa

  FIFTEEN Nina felt a little unsteady with hunger by the time lunch arrived. She relished the tuna sandwich and fruit salad that had been laid out for her. ‘Did Connor have a nice birthday?’ Gilly asked as she poured hot water into a mug. ‘I think he did. I’m relieved, really. I didn’t know what the first one without his dad was going to be like, b
ut it was okay.’ ‘Well, that can only be a good thing.’ ‘Yup.’ Nina nodded. ‘Have you got your tickets for the rugby end-of-season dinner? I’ve assumed you will be at our table?’ ‘I don’t know anything about it.’ Gilly looked a little shocked. ‘Girl, it’s the event of the year! After the last game, we have a swanky dinner in the school hall with dancing and awards for the players. It’s lovely. The boys all go for free and our ticket price covers the cost of the evening.’ ‘Oh yes, count me in!’ She wondered immediately about the cost. ‘Does Tiggy want to come?’ Gilly asked. ‘It would be good to meet her. You speak so highly of her.’ ‘I’ll ask he

  SIXTEEN The mid-July air was warm and full of summer promise. Nina spied the boy Joshy, with the burgundy knitted scarf, sober now and being collected by an over-fussy mother and a patient dad as they loaded his trunk and TV into the back of a family car. Portswood Road was quieter, as if it could take a breather from the constant hum of life that filled it day and night as the throngs of students had dissipated for the summer. Toothless Vera was glad that without the students, her workload was halved, which meant more time for Styrofoam cups of tea in exchange for a good old gossip. Lucia told Nina she had decided to try to study at home, focusing on her art between cleaning jobs, working in the store and looking after her siblings. Nina told her she should be proud of herself. The smile of thanks she gave her was like a gift. She couldn’t wait to be in a similar position and start her nursing course. It was exciting. She and her boys enjoyed breakfast with the French doors thrown ope

  BOOK CLUB QUESTIONS Did Nina’s story alter your view of whether money will guarantee happiness? If so, how? Which member of the McCarrick family did you most sympathise with, and why? Has The Art of Hiding changed you or broadened your perspective? If so, how? What, for you, was the book’s main message? In a movie, who would play the part of Nina, her eldest son, Connor, his younger brother, Declan and Nina’s sister, Tiggy? There were a number of difficult choices that Nina made – what did you think of those choices? Did you agree/disagree with them? Did any parts of the book make you feel uncomfortable? If so, which parts, and why? What will be the overriding memory from The Art of Hiding, the one incident or paragraph that will stay with you?